1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an optical analysis system, particularly but not exclusively suited to automated analysis of large numbers of samples, and further, to a positioning apparatus for the samples of such a system.
2. Description of the Related Art
For many clinical, forensic or other applications, it is required to perform fluorescence/polarization (FPIA) or other optical analyses on large quantities of samples, which may individually be very small "microspots".
The microspots may be typically a few tens of micrometres in diameter, and may need to be aligned with a fluorescent probe, and focussed to similar tolerances. While it is feasible to align and bring into focus a small number of samples manually, (e.g. using an adjustable stage viewed through a microscope) there is a need for a rapid method of achieving this automatically.